U.S. President Barack Obama arrived at Vientiane, Laos, to attend the ASEAN summit. He became the first U.S. president to visit Laos. He is expected to discuss U.S. efforts to clean up the unexploded ordnance that were dropped during 1964 to 1973, wherein U.S. warplanes dropped more than 270 million cluster munitions on Laos that were part of CIAâ€™s secret operation to destroy supply routes of North Vietnam fighters. The U.S. ran 580,000 bombing missions where one-third of the bombs never exploded, contaminating the land and leaving a trail of devastation. About 20,000 Lao were either killed or injured, even after the completion of the Vietnam War.
Credit:
Reuters